"Spare the Dying"- Rian/Deet
She eluded him for so long, but she’s easy to find now- curled in the center of a crater of her own making, a thirty foot radius of rot and decay all around her. She radiates exhaustion even as energy crackles around her, rooted to this spot like another of the blackened trees.
She’s taken too much, suffered too much to spare the suffering of others. He can’t let this be the end for her.
She deserves to see a world as kind as the one she had once believed in.
“Deet,” he whispers, an echo of the tenderness that had been stolen from them. He nearly reaches to touch her face- but no, not yet. He can see in her eyes that the end is near- she’s too tired to run, or even cringe away to protect him as she once had.
“Ri……..an…….” It’s barely audible, but it’s enough to pull the knot in his chest tighter, and to reaffirm that his choice is right.
“Take my hands,” he murmurs, reaching. Even the air around her burns his palms. “This is destroying you. Let me take it from you.” A breath, and a question hanging between them. “ Please."
“......But…..” He can see how difficult it is for her to even form words now, and in a way he knows he’s taking the choice away from her, the same way his father had from him so many trine ago. It may be that this is his family’s destiny, but if so, it’s one he can be proud of. There will be love waiting for him within the Song.
“Take my hands,” he says again. It’s a comfort to know hers will be the last thing he feels. He has missed them. “I’ll be fine.”
It’s a lie, but one he hopes she can forgive in her memories of him someday.